A look at a second language learnes' task motivation

In this study, part of a larger project, I explore a) the possible relationship between task motivation as operationalized in Dörnyei's Process model of motivation and linguistic variables in a written production task, and b) the differences in performance between two task motivation groups. This model has proven valid with oral argumentative tasks and now its main tenets are tested using a semi-guided writing activity. 65 students of Spanish at Georgetown University took part in this project. In this preliminary analysis, correlations between task motivation and linguistic variables were carried out to ascertain the possible relationships. Also, Independent samples t-test analysis served as a tool to establish possible significant differences among two task motivation groups. Results show that task motivation indeed holds a significant positive linear relationship with the linguistic variables investigated. Results also show the high motivation group significantly outperforms the low motivation group

Comics, Law, and Aesthetics:Towards the Use of Graphic Fiction in Legal Studies

This article argues for the inclusion of comics amongst the resources examined in interdisciplinary legal studies. Law and humanities enriches understanding of the human and experiential dimensions of justice through engagement with a variety of aesthetic discourses. The comics medium, however, remains under-researched in this context. Comics are distinct in their interaction of word and image, existing at the borderline between the textual and the visual, and between the rational and the aesthetic; they can thus assist in navigating the limits of rational language, a key issue for legal knowledge and debate which are deeply ingrained with this means of representation. The ‘in-betweenness’ of comics not only challenges the idealised use of text for the articulation of legal issues, but enables engagement with a wider set of interacting knowledges beyond the rational that can help triangulate issues surrounding justice in a human world inhabited by sensual beings

Beyond the American century: Walter Lippmann and American grand strategy, 1943-1950

As the United States became a world Power, journalist and intellectual Walter Lippmann feared that it would become its own worst enemy. During and after the Second World War, he tried to steer the country towards coherent statecraft, to define the national interest and the limits of power, and give geopolitical expression to the role of the United States as the core of an Atlantic strategic system. But in response to world war, the Truman Doctrine, and the Korean War, he became pessimistic about the country's ability to conduct strategy effectively. In the prophetic tradition, he believed that a fatal symbiosis between America's growing strength and domestic politics led it towards crisis. Though at times ahistorical, Lippmann's concept of strategy deserves attention for its dialogue between power and identity, for its questioning of “ends” as well as means, and for its focus on the danger of self-defeating behaviour

Panel by panel: Changing personal narratives through the creation of sequential art and the graphic novel.

The creation of comics, or sequential art, as a therapeutic tool offers a way for artists and clients alike to transform their personal narratives through a medium that transcends both spoken and written language. Artists and writers have frequently used comics to translate stories of hardship, mental health, trauma, healing, and grief in the form of memoirs and autobiographical graphic novels. Recently, the field of mental health and creative arts therapies have begun to incorporate reading and creation of comics with clients in the therapeutic space. This research uses an arts-based heuristic methodology to examine the process of combining narrative therapy concepts and interventions with comics creation in order to add further dimension to the re-storying process. This is achieved through the creation of the author’s own autobiographical graphic novella exploring a year of her early adolescence. Using the artmaking experience and the final product as a source for the collection of data, this research explores how combining literary and visual storytelling devices with narrative therapy interventions can facilitate therapeutic change. This research examines the possibilities of using comics creation in therapeutic spaces and illuminates the benefits of using graphic novels as an accessible tool of support and psychoeducation in populations with minimal access to mental health services

The relationship between task difficulty and second language fluency in French:a mixed-methods approach

While there exists a considerable body of literature on task-based difficulty and second language (L2) fluency in English as a second language (ESL), there has been little investigation with French learners. This mixed-methods study examines learner appraisals of task difficulty and their relationship to automated utterance fluency measures in French under three different task conditions. Participants were 40 adult learners of French at varying levels of proficiency studying in a university immersion context in Québec. Appraisal of task difficulty was assessed quantitatively by participants’ self-reports in response to a five-item questionnaire and qualitatively by retrospective interviews. Utterance fluency was operationalized by four temporal variables and measured by Praat, a speech analysis software program. Across tasks, the quantitative results indicate that appraisals of lexical retrieval difficulty and fluency difficulty were most strongly related to perceived overall task difficulty. The qualitative analysis shows how L2 speakers evaluated the difficulty of each task as well as the features that either contributed to or limited their L2 fluency. Students’ fluency in performing the three tasks was found to differ for articulation rate and average pause time, but not for pause frequency or phonation-time ratio